and that really made me laugh. and i know the family greatly concerned about his health over the past few years. and that is a part of what the cuban government said they were dealing with his health, and releasing him on humanitarian grounds, but we now know that alan will make a statement here shortly. yes, i m looking forward to seeing that. and, i can t imagine that you and the other family members are not planning some huge celebration, even though this is all happening very fast. and is moving rather quickly. but we wanted to have you on to hear the joy in your voice that i haven t had, felt this light hearted in over five years. i saw alan in october of 2009, we had a family wedding. it was a wonderful occasion, and that s the last time i saw him. and i ve been putting on a happy face hopefully trying, but always felt the heaviness, and now, i feel wonderful. well, we are absolutely
imagine loving your numbers. ask your doctor about invokana®. mmmmmmm. look out. now there s even more of the amazing cinnamon taste you love on cinnamon toast crunch. crave those crazy squares even more. we re about perhaps 15 minutes away from hearing from president obama who will discuss the release of alan gross and what could be a historic change in the u.s. diplomatic changes with cuba. we ll hear from cuban president who will address his nation on the major developments this morning. joining me now is mark murray and chris jansing. chris, let me start with you.
he s going to announce that commerce can be eased. people who travel back and forth will be allowed to purchase some items in cuba. bring them back. so this is going to be a significant shift in u.s. policy with cuba. as you point out, raul castro set to speak at noon. he ll address that major shift as well. kristen, i hope you can standby. i want to bring in eugene robinson. a columnist for the washington. in an article you criticized the administration for putting cuba on the list for supporting terrorism. you wrote that the obama administration made but progress toward a fact-based relationship has been tentive and halting at best. here we are potentially seeing the largest ease in relations in
released and they re heading back to havana. that was not an exchange for alan gross. instead they re making it clear that was an exchange for an intelligent asset of the u.s. who had been imprisoned in cuba for 20 years, tamron. i m being told that the contents of the background call that we received are now able to be reported out. i m going to be give you some of the details. president obama will be announcing a shift in policy between the united states and between cuba. he s going to announce that a number of restrictions will be eased between the two cubs when it comes like travel and commerce. it s going to be a major shift in relations and u.s. embassy will be set up in cuba. of course, that is significant. this is going to be the largest easing of relations between the united states and cuba that we have seen in decades. so this is certainly going to be a significant announcement. this entire exchange was has
street from this because this is economy. this is money. these are dollars we re now talking about. we re about 30 minutes away from hearing more specifics from the president. the dow is up 118 points. we don t know if that is the reason. we have to wonder what will be the impact there. we re talking about numbers and money. yeah. we re talking about economic trade embargo. for the business community they ve been pushing for changes for years. it s influenced greatly, obviously, president obama when he first came in then secretary of state hillary clinton who talked openly at the beginning of that administration about changes in cuba. you know, what theered that plan, that hope for warming relations with cuba, frankly, was the cuban decision to arrest alan gross. that s what held everything in place, froze all of that hope. and i think definitely, as you said for the business community, for wall street and others. we re the only country not doing business in cuba. it hurts our relati